


Make Love, Not Highly Dangerous Chemical Abominations

by INMH



Category: Bully (Video Games), Bully: Scholarship Edition
Genre: But that's pretty canon anyway, Earnest is kinda creepy in this I'm not gonna lie, F/M, For the most part, Gen, General, Humor, Innuendo, Love Potion/Spell, Strong Language, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-06
Updated: 2014-09-06
Packaged: 2018-02-16 08:15:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2262420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Earnest is desperate, Jimmy is concerned for the future of the world, and Beatrice wonders when her clique became so collectively stupid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make Love, Not Highly Dangerous Chemical Abominations

**Author's Note:**

> I posted this on my journal a while ago, and apparently I forgot to post it here as well.

“We can do it.”  
  
Earnest was doubtful.  
  
The idea was a thing of fantasy, of scientific progress long beyond their lifetimes.  
  
_But then, we not say the same things about putting a man on the moon? About boxes that could transmit sound and pictures into our living rooms? About machines that could grind coffee down to a fine powder and produce it in large quantities for mass consumption?!_  
  
Yes, yes they had.  
  
Still, the idea felt... Outlandish.  
  
“We can do it!” Melvin insisted, hissing over the table at his leader. In the library they spoke no louder than a gentle whisper; they were the common folk of this place, and knew its rules well. “We can do it. We know the chemicals of love, Earnest! We simply need to create a concoction that affects serotonin, oxytocin, and dopamine levels in the brain and we will have created _love!_ ”  
  
Earnest considered this with great caution.  
  
The power over love, and who a person loved; was that playing God too much? But then, once again, had revolutionary scientists not been accused for centuries of playing God by silly, small-minded fools? Great things had been accomplished in the name of scientific exploration, things that never would have been accomplished if those great minds had given in to skepticism!  
  
He leaned forward. “You’ve done the calculations?”  
  
Melvin held his head high. “Fatty’s working out the last of them. We’ll have a formula for a brew prepared by tonight.”  
  
Earnest drummed his fingers against the desk, face thoughtful. “And Dr. Watts is always willing to let us use the lab.” He paused. “I mean, when he’s not in the throes of some horrible hallucination. But we should have access to it.”  
  
Melvin nodded eagerly. “Precisely! We can spend the afternoon in the lab tomorrow after classes are through, and hopefully we’ll have something to test on Friday!” He leaned in with a sly smile. “And I know exactly who you want to test it on.”  
  
Yes…  
  
She was a vixen of sublime beauty, one whom had managed to elude Earnest’s suave charms on multiple occasions. But perhaps with this little push, this little potion meant to open her up to the possibility of a world with Earnest as her knight in shining armor, her Level 10 Mage King with 40+ magic ability…  
  
Maybe Mandy would finally be _his_.  
  
[---]  
  
She was a glorious minx, a beauty of the highest caliber. Her grace and beauty were things highly spoken of by all who encountered her, and she was held aloft as the figure of schoolgirl perfection in their institution. All of the girls wanted to emulate her, and every man in school wanted to be the one who walked into class with her on his arm. She was royalty, a queen, elegant and powerful, gloriously in control.  
  
What would he not give to have her at his side? With his brains and her charm and feminine power, what could they not accomplish? Bullworth would bow before them or be annihilated; they would see their enemies crushed, the cliques driven before them, hear the lamentations of their women as, yes, he and she rose above them and gloried in the fruits of victory!

  
He could see it now, her smile directed at _him_ as the sun rose red with a bloody victory, and oh, how she looked beautiful with the fire of the burning gymnasium glowing behind her-!  
  
“Earnest!”  
  
Earnest jumped sharply, almost sweeping a couple of Erlenmeyer flasks off of the table in his surprise. At some point after he’d lost touch with reality, class had ended and the chemistry room had cleared of everyone but himself, Melvin, Bucky, and Thad. Immediately, he crossed his legs and spun to face Melvin with a (hopefully) convincing look of innocence. “Yes?”  
  
If Melvin suspected that Earnest had lapsed into one of his little fantasies again, he gave no sign of it. “We have permission from Dr. Watts to use the lab.”  
  
“He said that he needed some time away from the vapors anyway,” Bucky added.  
  
Earnest slid off of his stool and joined the others around another bench where Melvin was arranging several small, orange pill bottles. The labels had been scratched off, and the caps were each marked with only with numbers. Earnest glanced at his second-in-command with a little bit of hesitation. “What are these?”  
  
Melvin did not look up. “Raw materials.”  
  
Earnest swallowed. _We’re all making easy A’s in Chemistry. We know what we’re doing._ He then straightened up and reassumed his commanding demeanor. “Excellent! What do we have?”  
  
“An assortment of medications affecting various chemical processes in the brain- namely, those that affect one’s ability to feel attraction, pleasure, and of course, love.” Melvin grinned and wiggled his eyebrows. “We’ll have _all_ the wenches once we’ve cracked the secret of the right formula.”  
  
“I’m still not sure about this,” Bucky said, picking up one of the bottles and examining it with worry. “We aren’t pharmacists. Should we really be mixing medications together like this?”  
  
Melvin rolled his eyes and snatched the bottle back. “We’re not just going to be randomly mixing things together, Bucky! We will be carefully combining select amount of each in order to produce the optimal results! We’re not just going to mix things together willy-nilly. That would just be stupid and dangerous.”  
  
Bucky nodded. “I guess you’re right.”  
  
“Absolutely!” Thad agreed.  
  
“We’ll be fine, amigos.” Earnest assured them. They were, after all, the top-achievers in the school; they knew what they were doing. “Melvin, this was your idea. Where are we going to start?”  
  
Melvin adjusted his glasses and folded his arms behind his back. “As you can see, we have an assortment of materials here in order to achieve our goal. We will start by examining each pill available to us, and determining how much of each should be combined together with other various materials in order to…”  
  
Earnest began to drift off again.  
  
Could Mandy be within reach? Earnest was always willing to trust Melvin, but the idea that simple science could bring Mandy to a mutual feeling for him was too good to be true.  
  
It was crazy.  
  
It was not _logical_.  
  
But damn it, how could he say no? He was desperate!  
  
Earnest nodded solemnly. “Let’s begin.”  
  
[---]  
  
“ _What_ the **_hell?!_** ”  
  
Jimmy opened one eye, brow furrowing in confusion.  
  
That sounded suspiciously like Beatrice who, first off, never came into the Boys’ dorm, and second, rarely ever raised her voice above room-level. Jimmy had been on the verge of a little cat-nap, but damn, curiosity was biting at him. He really, _really_ wanted to see what it was that was enough to send Beatrice into a rage; even Mandy taking her precious science notes hadn’t been enough to get her to scream.  
  
Rolling out of bed, Jimmy stretched and stepped out into the hallway.  
  
Beatrice was immediately visible. She was standing next to the couch, and seemed to be directing her wrath at someone who was either on said couch or near to it. “What do you think this is?!” She was having an absolute fit, waving her arms and stomping back and forth. “Grottoes and Gremlins?! Grow up! This isn’t a game! There are consequences to mixing volatile chemicals together, and none of them are an effective love-potion that you can use to seduce the head cheerleader!”  
  
Jimmy rubbed his eyes as he stepped into the common room. God, Bullworth was fucking insane. It wasn’t so much a question of ‘What new, weird thing happened’ so much as it was ‘What new, weird thing happened _this time_?’  
  
Beatrice did not acknowledge Jimmy when he entered, and he glanced over the back of the couch to see Earnest and Melvin lying on top of it. Now that he was in the room, he could see Bucky sprawled out on the poker table and Thad leaning against the soda machine. They all looked a little on the green side.  
  
“Wha-?” Earnest began, looking a little dazed, but she cut him off.  
  
“Oh, don’t play stupid! Everyone knows you’ve wanted to get your hand up Mandy’s skirt since you hit puberty!” Beatrice snarled.  
  
Jimmy snorted. “I haven’t even been here that long and I know that.”  
  
“I thought you knew better than this!”  
  
“Apparently they don’t!” Jimmy said, a smile unfurling on his face.  
  
Bucky tried to speak up from the table; surprising, as Jimmy had thought he was unconscious. “Beatrice, we were only trying to-”  
  
“I don’t want to hear it from you!” She screeched. “I thought you had a modicum of common sense!”  
  
“Guess I’m not the only new kid,” Jimmy chuckled.  
  
“Guys,” Thad said, “My nose is bleeding. Really badly.” No one acknowledged him.  
  
“What are you, Jocks?!”  
  
“They don’t have the muscle-mass.” Jimmy dismissed cheerfully.  
  
“Stop helping, Jimmy.” Melvin grunted. And then, seemingly against his will, his arm twitched sharply, jumping off of the arm of the couch. Jimmy stared.  
  
“The hell was that?”  
  
“It’s happened a few times now.” Melvin muttered dejectedly.  
  
“Seriously, guys, my vision’s getting blurry too.” Thad pressed.  
  
“When did you all become so _stupid?_ I have half a mind to lock you in your rooms so that you can’t endanger yourselves or anyone else!”  
  
Jimmy stared at her with something like adoration. “I think I like this side of you,” He said. Beatrice, either searching for more insults or catching her breath, didn’t continue, and so Jimmy took the opportunity to catch up. “What did you guys do?”  
  
“All we did,” Melvin said, apparently wanting to defend himself before Beatrice could start up again, “Was create a concoction that would induce feelings of intense attraction to another person by stimulating the chemicals and structures in the brain that-”  
  
“English, Melvin.” Jimmy interrupted. “ _Modern_ English.”  
  
“We tried to make a love potion.” Bucky croaked. He waited for Thad to finish his sudden fit of retching before continuing. “We tried to make it in the lab. Then we tried to test it on ourselves. And then…” He waved his arm limply at the assembled Nerds by way of explanation.  
  
Jimmy stared at them for a long moment. “…I thought you guys were supposed to be smart?” Why was he still questioning it? It was Bullworth. More than half the population was either stupid or crazy, and he didn’t know why he’d thought the Nerds would be an exception to that. Anyone willing to plaster dirty pictures of the football captain’s girlfriend all over town clearly didn’t have their marbles all in one bag.  
  
“Oh, shut up! It was a beautiful plan in theory, and we had all of the science to back it up!” Earnest glared at him. “You wouldn’t understand.”  
  
Jimmy snickered. “ _I_ don’t understand. That’s rich.” Then he sobered up. “Damn, the idea that you guys are gonna be the ones becoming doctors and scientists is _terrifying._ ”  
  
“I _know_ ,” Beatrice said, crossing her arms and glaring viciously at her clique-mates. “It’s an embarrassment to the Nerd name! We’re supposed to be above the idiocy of our classmates.”  
  
Jimmy raised an eyebrow at that, but didn’t say anything.  
  
“There is one other, minor problem,” Bucky said, raising a finger.  
  
“Well…” Melvin paused and shuddered, reaching up to rub his temples. “…Believing that the concoction worked, and with few negative consequences, we… We decided that it might be humorous to introduce it to the Jocks’ Gatorade and hopefully make them fall in love with Russell and his boys.”  
  
Jimmy’s mouth fell open slightly, and he slapped a hand over his eyes. “Please tell me you’re joking.”  
  
“I can’t feel my legs.” Thad piped up.  
  
“We’re not joking.”  
  
“What the _hell_ made you think that your dumbass little science-project actually worked?”  
  
“Placebo effect,” Beatrice sighed, rubbing her eyes. “They want to believe that it worked, so they felt what they expected to feel.”  
  
“So Ted isn’t going to, say, make out with Russell and give me a great blackmail opportunity?” Jimmy asked, and Beatrice shook her head. “Damn, that’s a shame.” He pushed himself away from the couch and started for the door. “I’ll go dump the cooler. The Jocks are dumb enough, and swallowing one of your concoctions won’t improve that.”  
  
_I’ll accept your grateful payment later_ , he added silently. Like hell he was risking his ass for free.  
  
[---]  
  
Beatrice retrieved the remainder of the mixture from Earnest and Melvin’s room, pointedly ignoring the odd looks she received from the various boys she encountered, and dumped them out in the dorms’ bathroom. She must have looked angry enough, however, that none of them felt like asking her why she was there.  
  
Good, because she was still very much on edge and would be more than happy to tell that to anyone who asked.  
  
When she was done, she returned to the common room where her clique-mates remained. She glanced at Thad, apparently unconscious and still slumped against the soda machine. “Should we bring him to the nurse?”  
  
“He’s fine,” Earnest muttered, waving his hand dismissively. “He’s just being overly dramatic.”  
  
Beatrice, jaw set, settled down on the couch between Earnest and Melvin. “I can’t believe you _actually_ tried to make a love-potion.” She scoffed. “Gone are the days of true romance. Why make yourself appealing to a potential mate when you can always just force them into being attracted to you?”  
  
Earnest glared at her miserably. “Spoken like someone who has never been an inch away from the sweet, sweet nectar that is love.” His tone spoke of dejection and hopelessness. “I will never know the sweet embrace of that vengeful goddess. Oh, the agony.” His head sank down onto the couch arm in defeat.  
  
Beatrice sniffed. “Awful bitch or not, I wouldn’t wish you on Mandy any day,” She muttered to herself.  
  
“What was that, Beatrice?”  
  
“Nothing, nothing.”  
  
-End


End file.
